Bring back the Wild West with a cowboy birthday party for your child! Kids will love our cowboy games, decorations, and cowboy theme ideas in this complete cowboy party guide!

Order your Western Party supplies online to make shopping easy. This is one of the best time-saving tips because you avoid making trips to different stores. Then use this cowboy party guide to plan the decorations, games and party activities.

Gather all the toys you own that support this theme, such as stuffed horses, snakes, cowboy boots or horseshoes. Use them as table decorations or set a group of items in a red wagon to help set the mood.

Use red checkered tablecloths and red and white balloons and streamers.

Give each guest a cowboy hat and a sheriff badge as they arrive plus a red bandana to wear around their neck. Use a washable marker to draw a curly mustache on the kids.

Make a jail out of a refrigerator box by painting a brick design on the outside and cutting some bars where the children can look out. You could even create a little Wild West town out of large boxes. Paint them to be a saloon, hotel and sheriff’s office as well as the jail.

Play country western music. Kids will enjoy songs like Mama, Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys by Waylon Jennings, Cotton Eyed Joe, and the theme music from the Bonanza and Rawhide TV shows.

Make a “Wanted” poster for each guest using this template from Martha Stewart.com and hang them on the wall (or the side of the jail) for decoration. Insert a photo of each child and make up “crimes” like “wanted for stealing a cow” or “ for robbing a bank” or “for teasing his sister”. If the party is outdoors, string a line between two trees and hang the wanted posters using clothespins.

Anchor clusters of red balloons around the party area, and tie a group of five balloons to the birthday child’s chair.

Lasso the Steer – Glue pictures of steers onto empty 2-liter bottles. Give the children a rope lasso (or you could substitute pool rings) and let them try to lasso a steer.

Herd the Ponies – Divide the children into two teams with three balloons per team. The first child on each team uses a broom to “herd” the 3 balloon “ponies” across the room (or your yard). Keep going until all the members of both teams have a turn. The first team to finish is the winner.

Panning for Gold – Fill a kiddy pool with water and drop in a variety of small rocks painted gold. Then scatter a bag or two of sand on top. Buy foil pie pans and poke holes in the bottom. At the party, let the kids scoop up some sand and water in a pie pan (most of it will pour out through the holes) to see if they’ve found any gold nuggets.

O.K. Corral Shootout – Set empty soda cans on a table and let the kids throw balls to knock them down.

Quick Draw – Separate the kids into pairs for this game and have two identical squirt guns. Tell the first two players to stand with their backs together and count out loud as they walk ten steps away from each other. After the tenth step, they both turn around quickly to face each other and try to squirt their opponent first with the water gun. You can have all the winners pair up for a second round, and keep going until only one player is left.

Squirt Gun Target Practice – Set up a target and use a squirt gun to see if anyone can get a bull’s-eye.

Pin the Tail on the Horse or Pin the Badge on the Sheriff – Make your own poster and cut out tails or badges from construction paper.